Yemeni members of the southern separatist movement, loyal to president Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, standing next to a tank on June 1, 2015 in Aden’s eastern suburbs. The same day, a UN-chartered ship loaded with humanitarian supplies bound for Hodeidah wasforced to turn back after it was targeted by shelling as it approached Aden. Saleh Al Obeidi/AFP Photo
Yemeni members of the southern separatist movement, loyal to president Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, standing next to a tank on June 1, 2015 in Aden’s eastern suburbs. The same day, a UN-chartered ship loaded with humanitarian supplies bound for Hodeidah wasforced to turn back after it was targeted by shelling as it approached Aden. Saleh Al Obeidi/AFP Photo
Yemeni members of the southern separatist movement, loyal to president Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, standing next to a tank on June 1, 2015 in Aden’s eastern suburbs. The same day, a UN-chartered ship loaded with humanitarian supplies bound for Hodeidah wasforced to turn back after it was targeted by shelling as it approached Aden. Saleh Al Obeidi/AFP Photo
Yemeni members of the southern separatist movement, loyal to president Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, standing next to a tank on June 1, 2015 in Aden’s eastern suburbs. The same day, a UN-chartered ship loaded

UN aid ship forced to turn back from Aden after shelling by Houthis


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Aden // A UN-chartered ship carrying desperately needed food supplies was forced to turn back from Aden after shelling by Houthi rebels, UN and local officials said.

The World Food Programme said on Monday that the MV Amsterdam was carrying enough grain and other food aid to sustain 60,000 people for a month but was unable to dock in the southern port city on Sunday and was diverted to the port of Hodeidah.

A provincial government official blamed the Houthi rebels, who control several neighbourhoods in Aden, for not allowing the ship to dock at the port, which is controlled by pro-government fighters.

“The Houthis fired shells at a ship chartered by the UN that was carrying 7,000 tonnes of food ... when it was within a nautical mile of Aden’s port,” the official said, adding that the vessel was not hit.

“The ship was forced to turn back and by night time it was about five to eight nautical miles from Aden,” he added.

The vessel had set off from Djibouti, which the UN uses as a hub for humanitarian aid bound for Yemen, he said.

A port official confirmed the incident and accused the rebels of “imposing a food blockade on areas of Aden under the control of the Popular Resistance Committees” comprised of fighters loyal to Yemen’s UN-backed president, Abdrabu Mansur Hadi.

UN officials will try to move the food to Aden by road if the security situation allows, said Abeer Etefa, a World Food Programme spokeswoman.

Aden has been one of the hardest hit areas in more than two months of conflict, including heavy street fighting, between pro-Hadi forces and the Iran-backed Houthis and their allies loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. Saudi Arabia has been leading an air campaign in support of the effort to restore Mr Hadi to power.

“It’s a humanitarian crisis,” Ms Etefa said. “The city has been cut off from supplies for a long time.”

She said Aden residents had no running water or electricity, and food shops were empty because supplies have not been getting into the city.

Aid groups have warned that the continuation of fighting could deepen the humanitarian crisis across Yemen.

Famine Early Warning Systems, a monitoring group, said on Monday that food price increases and lack of income in the war-torn country could soon push remote areas of Yemen into emergency.

“Due to the continued impact of ongoing shocks, food security outcomes are likely to deteriorate over the coming months,” the group said.

The Local Rescue Committee, a Yemeni humanitarian group in the southern province on Dhale near Aden, warned on Monday that residents in the area were suffering after being cut off from aid by the Houthis.

“We’re calling for emergency aid to alleviate the disastrous humanitarian situation for a quarter of a million people in the province,” an official said.

“Food, fuel and electricity are in short supply while sickness is spreading due to poor sanitation and stopped rubbish collection, meanwhile Dhale is cut off by Houthi militias from resupply in every direction.”

Meanwhile, political sources in Oman confirmed on Monday that diplomats in Yemen’s neutral neighbour were brokering talks in Muscat between Houthi and US officials aimed at finding a peaceful resolution to the conflict.

Independent politicians in Sanaa said the talks have succeeded in narrowing gaps between the Houthis and Mr Hadi’s exiled government to pave the way for eventual United Nations-backed negotiations in Geneva.

“There’s progress in the talks toward an agreement on a long truce and reviving political dialogue,” one politician said.

Oman is the only member of the six-country Gulf Cooperation Council not taking part in the Saudi-led coalition against the rebels in Yemen.

Coalition warplanes on Monday continued airstrikes on rebels positions across the country, targeting an arms depot on the Mount Noqum base on the outskirts of Sanaa.

Other airstrikes hit rebel positions in Amran, north of the capital, as well as arms depots in western Hodeidah province, residents said.

Coalition warplanes also struck rebel positions in the southern province of Dhale, military and tribal sources said.

In the rebels’ stronghold of Saada, overnight coalition raids struck rebel-held arms depots in the town of Marran, as well as rebel positions in Ibb, farther south in central Yemen, witnesses said.

The conflict has killed almost 2,000 people and wounded 8,000 since mid March, according to the World Health Organisation.

* Reuters and Agence France-Presse

BIGGEST CYBER SECURITY INCIDENTS IN RECENT TIMES

SolarWinds supply chain attack: Came to light in December 2020 but had taken root for several months, compromising major tech companies, governments and its entities

Microsoft Exchange server exploitation: March 2021; attackers used a vulnerability to steal emails

Kaseya attack: July 2021; ransomware hit perpetrated REvil, resulting in severe downtime for more than 1,000 companies

Log4j breach: December 2021; attackers exploited the Java-written code to inflitrate businesses and governments

Specs
Engine: Electric motor generating 54.2kWh (Cooper SE and Aceman SE), 64.6kW (Countryman All4 SE)
Power: 218hp (Cooper and Aceman), 313hp (Countryman)
Torque: 330Nm (Cooper and Aceman), 494Nm (Countryman)
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Price: From Dh158,000 (Cooper), Dh168,000 (Aceman), Dh190,000 (Countryman)
The specs
  • Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
  • Power: 640hp
  • Torque: 760nm
  • On sale: 2026
  • Price: Not announced yet
2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups

Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.

Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.

Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.

Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, Leon.

Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.

Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.

Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.

Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The specs: 2018 Infiniti QX80

Price: base / as tested: Dh335,000

Engine: 5.6-litre V8

Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic

Power: 400hp @ 5,800rpm

Torque: 560Nm @ 4,000rpm

Fuel economy, combined: 12.1L / 100km

Married Malala

Malala Yousafzai is enjoying married life, her father said.

The 24-year-old married Pakistan cricket executive Asser Malik last year in a small ceremony in the UK.

Ziauddin Yousafzai told The National his daughter was ‘very happy’ with her husband.

F1 The Movie

Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem

Director: Joseph Kosinski

Rating: 4/5

How much do leading UAE’s UK curriculum schools charge for Year 6?
  1. Nord Anglia International School (Dubai) – Dh85,032
  2. Kings School Al Barsha (Dubai) – Dh71,905
  3. Brighton College Abu Dhabi - Dh68,560
  4. Jumeirah English Speaking School (Dubai) – Dh59,728
  5. Gems Wellington International School – Dubai Branch – Dh58,488
  6. The British School Al Khubairat (Abu Dhabi) - Dh54,170
  7. Dubai English Speaking School – Dh51,269

*Annual tuition fees covering the 2024/2025 academic year

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Sole survivors
  • Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
  • George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
  • Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
  • Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
Conflict, drought, famine

Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.

Band Aid

Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN GAZA

Starring: Nader Abd Alhay, Majd Eid, Ramzi Maqdisi

Directors: Tarzan and Arab Nasser

Rating: 4.5/5

yallacompare profile

Date of launch: 2014

Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer

Based: Media City, Dubai 

Sector: Financial services

Size: 120 employees

Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)

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Key facilities
  • Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
  • Premier League-standard football pitch
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  • NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
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  • Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
  • An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
  • Specialist robotics and science laboratories
  • AR and VR-enabled learning centres
  • Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The biog

Favourite food: Fish and seafood

Favourite hobby: Socialising with friends

Favourite quote: You only get out what you put in!

Favourite country to visit: Italy

Favourite film: Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.

Family: We all have one!

Test

Director: S Sashikanth

Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan

Star rating: 2/5

The National's picks

4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young

The burning issue

The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE. 

Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on

Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins

Read part one: how cars came to the UAE

 

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Range: 400km

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The specs: 2018 Ducati SuperSport S

Price, base / as tested: Dh74,900 / Dh85,900

Engine: 937cc

Transmission: Six-speed gearbox

Power: 110hp @ 9,000rpm

Torque: 93Nm @ 6,500rpm

Fuel economy, combined: 5.9L / 100km

GOLF’S RAHMBO

- 5 wins in 22 months as pro
- Three wins in past 10 starts
- 45 pro starts worldwide: 5 wins, 17 top 5s
- Ranked 551th in world on debut, now No 4 (was No 2 earlier this year)
- 5th player in last 30 years to win 3 European Tour and 2 PGA Tour titles before age 24 (Woods, Garcia, McIlroy, Spieth)

Six large-scale objects on show
  • Concrete wall and windows from the now demolished Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar
  • The 17th Century Agra Colonnade, from the bathhouse of the fort of Agra in India
  • A stagecloth for The Ballet Russes that is 10m high – the largest Picasso in the world
  • Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office
  • A full-scale Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, which transformed kitchen design in the 20th century
  • Torrijos Palace dome
Key Points
  • Protests against President Omar Al Bashir enter their sixth day
  • Reports of President Bashir's resignation and arrests of senior government officials
Company%20profile
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